Method to reduce light propagation losses in optical glasses and optical waveguide fabricated by same
AssigneeEastman Kodak Company
InventorsEric T. Prince, Sebastian F. Prospero, Mark M. Romach
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
The present invention provides a method of annealing optical glass layers, said method comprising the step of heating glass layers having an area greater than 0.01 cm.sup.2 to a temperature of between about 350 deg. C. and 1000 deg. C. in less than 10 minutes. The upper limit of the glass area that can be treated is limited only by the size of the quartz chamber. Current state-of-the-art chambers can accomodate glass areas of about 0.01 cm.sup.2 to about 324 cm.sup.2. According to another aspect of the invention, there is also provided an optical waveguide glass layer, treated according to the method of this invention, disposed on an integrated optical device.
Claims11
A method of annealing optical glass layers, said method comprising the step of heating glass layers having an area of about >0.01 cm.sup.2 -324 cm.sup.2 to a temperature of between about 350.degree. C. and 1000.degree. C. in less than 10 minutes.
An optical waveguide having a light propagation loss of about 0.01 dB/cm to about 1 dB/cm and prepared by heating glass layers having an area of about 0.01 cm.sup.2 to about 324 cm.sup.2 to a temperature of between about 350.degree. C. and 1000.degree. C. in less than 10 minutes.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.